Category Archives: Tips

I regularly teach meditation to people who have never meditated before and one of the common misconceptions is that meditation is the same as “relaxation.” While meditation may have a side benefit of helping you feel relaxed and peaceful, it is not the primary intention of meditation. The primary intention of meditation is to teach you how to be navigate your life (all of the ups and downs) without over reacting and getting stressed out. In other words, it teaches you how to alleviate your suffering.

And you don’t just have to take my word for it. In a recent study in the Journal of Cognitive Psychotherapy, mindfulness meditation was shown to be more effective than either “eyes-closed relaxation” or silence in increasing awareness, reducing depression, anxiety, blood pressure, and heart rate in a diverse sample of people. These health outcomes are extremely important for anyone experiencing the demands of school, work, major stress-related illnesses, and difficult living environments.

This study is particularly interesting because it was comprised of African American university students and urban residents. The use of diverse populations in research is extremely important in our ability to correctly understand the impact of interventions. Surprisingly enough, many researchers in the past have ignored gender, racial, and cultural differences with sometimes devastating consequences.

If you would like to try meditation, it can be helpful to join a group and have an experienced teacher lead you through the practice. Use the internet to search for programs near you by using the words “mindfulness meditation groups.” As an alternative, feel free to use the recordings on this website. I have meditation and yoga sessions that can be help you sail through the holiday season and on into the New Year.

I have been reading and practicing with some teachings on mindful speech recently and it seems to be an area of great difficulty for most people. I know it is for me and it is something that I am sure I will work on for the rest of my life.

What is mindful communication?

Mindful communication happens when you are truly present in this moment with curiosity, kindness, and compassion. You listen with an open, nonjudgmental heart to the other person. You speak skillfully, generally avoiding lying, harsh language, gossip, divisive speech. (Did I lose most of you here?) Before you speak, you ask yourself is it useful, true, beneficial, and timely.

If you’ve had a job for any length of time, it is not lost on you that your supervisor can have a significant impact on your day. Your relationship to your supervisor can make you feel like being more or less productive and empowered. As a leader, it is important to know what brings out the best in your employees. As an employee, it feels great to work for someone who understands and practices effective leadership skills.

The role of mindfulness in the workplace has increasingly been recognized as an important quality associated with better task performance, lower emotional exhaustion, better social relationships, and enhanced well-being (Narayanan, Chaturvedi, Reb, and Srinivas, 2011; Glomb, Duffy, Bono, and Yang, 2011). Research has also examined how supervisors’ mindfulness impacts their employees’ well-being and performance (Matthias, Narayanan, and Chaturvedi, 2014).

How mindfulness can help leaders in their ability to strengthen the workplace was directly examined in a recent study of a variety of work settings (Matthias, Narayanan, & Chaturvedi, 2014). The study found that employees whose supervisors who were more mindful had less emotional exhaustion and better work-life balance. Further, mindfulness of the supervisor was positively related to overall employee performance and job satisfaction and negatively related to employee deviance.

Mindfulness, present-moment awareness with an observing, non-judging stance, can influence the workplace in the following ways:

Move people from an adversarial mindset to a more collaborative mindset (Riskin, 2002)

Understand others’ emotional states as well as better understand one’s own emotions (Arch & Craskse, 2006)

Be fully present in interactions with each other in order to demonstrate respect

To become the leader that truly inspires, cultivating the skill of mindfulness can increase awareness of yourself and others in order to increase your emotional intelligence and authentic leadership ability—two concepts known to be associated with great leadership.

For more information about mindful leadership, check out Janice Marturano’s book “Finding the Space to Lead” and her website which has lots of mindfulness meditations you can use throughout the workday. Books on the Neuroleadership website by David Rock and “Search Inside Yourself” are also good resources for enhancing your leadership skills.

Having just finished an 8 week Mindfulness-based Stress Reduction Program (MBSR) this summer with faculty and staff at the University of Missouri, I noticed a particular common outcome for many of the participants. “My relationship with my husband/wife/partner/co-worker is better.”

There were a number of reasons why these relationships had improved.

1. I listened to my partner without interrupting.
2. I let my partner get angry or frustrated without needing to fix it.
3. I was able to tolerate negative emotions without running away.
4. I was able to let my negative reactions come and go without acting on them.
5. I am happier.

These improvements in relationships are backed up by current research which explores the how relationships improve with increased mindfulness. Wachs and Cordova (2007) found a significant correlation between mindfulness and global marital adjustment. In essence, “more mindful partners literally see each other more clearly, regard each other more nonjudgmentally, behave more responsively toward each other, and navigate challenging waters of intimacy more gracefully.”

Mindfulness increases the ability to both communicate emotions and understand the emotions of others. Mindfulness also helps you think twice about reacting to another person’s anger or stress–being able to access a sense of ease even in the midst of difficulties that often arise in relationships, be they marital or work.

Note: I offer two-for-one specials for spouses or partners on MBSR programs which are taught at each University of Missouri campus at least once a year (3 times in Columbia) and there is an excellent online version for free by my colleague Dave Potter if you can’t get to an in-person class. The next in-person classes start in September. If you work for the University of Missouri you can get 100 incentive points in 2016 for successfully completing any of these in-person and on-line programs.

Don’t wait to improve your relationships. Join an MBSR program in your area and let mindfulness come to the rescue.

With the current Fitbit craze, you’re probably aware of the health benefits of getting in 10,000 steps a day. But are you aware of all of the health benefits of smiling?

I’d like to invite you to do a little experiment. Put a smile on your face right now and leave it there for 30 seconds. Notice how it makes you feel. According to the facial feedback hypothesis, facial muscles not only express emotions, but they also have the ability to modulate how you feel. In other words, if you put a smile on your face you can change from feeling angry or anxious to feeling happier or initiate a happy feeling “out of the blue.” When you smile, you are literally sending messages to your brain that you’re happy and eventually you agree. Continue reading →